Now This Is Some Old Jewelry

[I LOVE reading stuff like this. Enjoy. LS]


This undated photo made available by the Israeli Antiquities Authority on Monday, Nov. 10, 2008 shows what archaeologists say is a 2,000-year-old gold earring discovered beneath a parking lot next to the walls of Jerusalem’s old city.


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JERUSALEM - A luxurious gold, pearl and emerald earring provides a new visual clue about the life of the elite in Jerusalem some 2,000 years ago.

And its discovery was a true eureka moment for excavators.

The piece was found beneath a parking lot next to the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City. It dates to the Roman period just after the time of Jesus, said Doron Ben-Ami, who directed the dig.

The earring was uncovered in a destroyed Byzantine structure built centuries after the piece was made, showing it was likely passed down through generations, he said.

Archaeologists came upon the earring in a corner while excavating the ruins of the building under a parking lot. "Suddenly one of the excavators came up shouting ’Eureka!’" said Ben-Ami.

The find is eye-catching: A large pearl inlaid in gold with two drop pieces, each with an emerald and pearl set in gold.

"It must have belonged to someone of the elite in Jerusalem," Ben-Ami said. "Such a precious item, it couldn’t be one of just ordinary people."

Archaeologist Shimon Gibson, who was not involved in the dig, said the find was truly amazing, less because of its Roman origins than for its precious nature.

"Jewelry is hardly preserved in archaeological context in Jerusalem," he said, because precious metals were often sold or melted down during the many historic takeovers of the city.

"It adds to the visual history of Jerusalem," Gibson added, saying it brings attention to the life of women in antiquity.

Ben-Ami the piece’s placement in the destroyed building protected it from looters and kept it preserved. Its location also showed that it must be older than the house itself.

The Israel Antiquities Authority said the earring appeared to have been made using a technique similar to that depicted in portraits from Roman-era Egypt. Experts were able to date the earring by comparing it to similar finds in Europe.

In a statement released Monday, the Antiquities Authority said the earring was "astonishingly well-preserved." Finds from the Roman period are rare in Jerusalem, Ben-Ami said, because the city was destroyed by the Roman Empire in the first century A.D.

Though Gibson dates the piece slightly later than the antiquities authority, to sometime between the second and fourth centuries A.D., he said its quality and beauty were impressive.

And Ben-Ami said he expects more small, luxury items to turn up in future excavations.

http://www.bostonherald.com/news/international/middle_east/view.bg?articleid=1131391&srvc=rss

Score One For Man's Best Friend

By Jessica Scarpati

An observer who had only watched the tallies come in from Bristol and Plymouth counties on Tuesday night could’ve been certain dog racing would survive.

Southeastern Massachusetts was the biggest stronghold to keep dog racing intact, voting by wide margins in opposition of Question 3, which makes dog racing illegal by January 2010.

But it was the remaining 299 cities and towns in the state that decided the fate of the state’s two dog tracks — some communities vehemently so, such as 97 percent of voters in New Marlborough, a town of about 1,200 in Berkshire County, who voted to end dog racing.

Ultimately, 56 percent of voters across the state voted to end the sport, effectively shutting down tracks in Raynham and Revere.

According to one expert, the voting breakdown suggests the tracks secured their support from their stakeholders — those who would suffer from its losses — or those who felt a solidarity with its blue-collar roots.

“People from a different class, who would be professional or higher-level income, are not likely participants in dog tracks,” said Michael Kryzanek, a political science professor at Bridgewater State College.

“I think there’s also probably a greater appreciation of the economic impact of the dog track (in this region) than there might be in other communities,” he said.

Thinner margins — but still supportive of racing — prevailed in blue-collar communities around Revere’s Wonderland Greyhound Park, such as Everett, Lynn and Saugus.

But every other region — Greater Boston, the Cape and the Islands, the North Shore, MetroWest, Central Massachusetts and the Berkshires — all came down on the side of the racing opponents.

“They worked harder and they were more aggressive,” Kryzanek said of the Committee to Protect Dogs, the group behind the ballot initiative. “Give them credit — they wanted it more.”

http://www.patriotledger.com/homepage/x852774481/Well-to-do-voters-killed-dog-racing

More From Demi & Bruce

Demi and sister to Rumer and Scout........Tallulah Belle Willis.

What? Did I say anything? I'm not saying a word.....

My Only Problem With Waking Up So Early....

is the fact that I'm guaranteed to be bored that much earlier in the day.

I'm pretty sure that's the ADD talking but there ya go. Slap me hard.

Born-Again Barbarella

NEW YORK - It wasn’t religion that broke up his marriage to Jane Fonda, Ted Turner declares in a new memoir.

He says he was "upset" when he discovered his wife’s "conversion," but "it wasn’t because she had become Christian," the 69-year-old Turner writes in "Call Me Ted," which comes out next week. The Associated Press obtained an early copy.

He was upset because Fonda didn’t talk to him about it.

Turner’s 433-page book, co-authored with former Turner Broadcasting executive Bill Burke, reviews his loquacious, multi-pronged rise as yachtsman, baseball team owner, cable visionary and philanthropist.

The book includes commentary from fellow America’s Cup racers, business moguls such as Bill Gates and former Time Warner chairman Gerald Levin, friends such as former President Carter, family members and Fonda, his wife for 10 years.

Fonda wrote at length about her marriage to Turner in her memoir "My Life So Far," and Turner adds a similar take without referring to the infidelities alleged against him by the Academy Award-winning actress. The two say they remain good friends.

He remembers their impulsive courtship, beginning in 1990 with his learning of her divorce from activist Tom Hayden and immediately calling her, a virtual stranger, for a date. She declined. He persisted. Six months later she accepted. They married in 1991.

They cared deeply about each other but spent so much time apart that they had "trouble communicating" even when together; not even couples therapy could save the marriage, with Fonda’s faith cited at the time as a possible cause for their divorce. Turner remembered going back to their Montana ranch for the first time after their split and seeing that Fonda had taken all her belongings.

"Our closets faced each other’s, and when I saw her empty space I sat down on the floor between them and cried," writes Turner, who had two previous wives.

The son of a demanding advertising magnate who killed himself when Turner was in his mid-20s, he acknowledges his own disturbing mood swings and writes that in the 1980s he was told he was bipolar and placed on lithium. After a couple of years, feeling little change, he tried a new psychiatrist, who reversed the earlier diagnosis and canceled the prescription.

Turner also looks back on his unlikely friendship with Fidel Castro (they hunted together, then argued about politics over rum and cigars) and his reconciliation with former rival Rupert Murdoch over a mutual concern about the environment. He defends his highly criticized decision to colorize such Hollywood classics as "Casablanca," reiterating previous comments that he was making old films more accessible to young audiences.

He looks back proudly on building his cable empire, including the founding of CNN, and sadly on his eventual departure from Time Warner, which bought out his Turner Broadcasting Systems in 1996. He still insists he was "fired" by Levin in the wake of Time Warner’s 2000 merger with AOL, and Levin, allowed to offer his side, still denies it (They no longer speak, Levin adds, regretfully).

In his hopefully titled conclusion, "Onward and Upward," Turner says he has "very few regrets," vows to live long and well enough to fill a second book and wonders what should be inscribed on his tombstone.

As a young celebrity, he wanted "You Can’t Interview Me Here." In middle age, he liked "Here Lies Ted Turner. He Never Owned a Broadcast Network."

As an older man and published author: "I Have Nothing More to Say."

© Copyright 2008 Associated Press.

http://www.bostonherald.com/entertainment/books/view.bg?articleid=1130903&srvc=rss

Oh, Oprah...Say It Ain't So

The chief executive of Oprah Winfrey's business partner in her Oprah Winfrey Network, or OWN, cable channel said today he expects the Queen of Daytime Talk to retire her nationally syndicated Chicago-based TV show in 2011, but Winfrey's spokeswoman insisted that's not yet set in stone.

OWN is a 50-50 multi-platform venture between Winfrey's Harpo Productions and Discovery Communications that's set to launch next year.

"The expectation is that after [the 2010-11 season] her show will go off of … syndication, and she will come to OWN," David Zaslav, Discovery's president and CEO, said in a call with analysts. "We're talking now about what that presence would be and what programming she would be involved in directly. But this is her Chapter Two, and building the OWN brand online and on-air is something that she and I, we're working [on] together and it's a core mission for her."

Winfrey's current contract with CBS Television Distribution to do "The Oprah Winfrey Show" does in fact expire in 2011 after her 25th season on national TV. But Lisa Halliday, chief spokeswoman for Winfrey's Harpo Productions, cast Zaslav's remark as premature. "She has not made a final decision as to whether she will continue her show in syndication beyond that," Halliday said in a statement.


http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-081107oprah-show,0,3715962.story

Blackberry Addict

How in the hell did I ever get by without this thing?
I want to buy it flowers and take it to the movies.